Transgender socio economic development in india

TRANSGENDER SOCIO ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN INDIA

 

By Nithya.A

Life Skill Trainer

 

 

Introduction

 

At present only Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra governments having transgender development bodies.

 

Transgender is an umbrella term for all whose self-identity is outside the boundaries of biological sex and/or culturally determined gender expression, including transsexual people, crossdressers, Two-Spirit people, drag performers, and people who do not self-identify with their biological sex.

 

In recent years, many programs for LGBT youth have witnessed an increased presence of youth who self-identify as transgender. Youth who do not conform to prevalent gender norms, usually represented as feminine women and masculine men, often experience severe harassment, discrimination, ostracism, and violence. Transgender youth are increasingly claiming their right to define and express themselves in new ways. These new ways include but are not limited to hormone treatment, gender reassignment surgery, name change, and cross-living. Professionals who work with LGBT youth, in particular, increasingly observe the diverse ways in which these youth choose to identify, including making the choice not to identify.

Improving self strength (self analysis)

Youth-serving professionals, parents, families, peers, and community members can play key roles in supporting the healthy development of transgender youth. Respecting transgender youth means taking responsibility for providing them with a safe and supportive environment. The following recommendations will not answer all questions.

 

• Don't make assumptions: Do not assume that you know a youth's gender, or that a youth has gender identity issues, just as you would not make assumptions about a young person's sexual orientation. Exploring gender is a healthy expression of personal development. Self-identification or self-acknowledgement is a crucial first step in a youth's identity development and self-expression.
• Create a safe space for open discussion: Work towards creating an affirming environment that supports non-stereotypical gender expression and offers safe space for open discussion. Use inclusive, affirming, non-presumptuous, nonjudgmental, and gender-neutral language. Create organizational norms on behavior and language with youth.
• Be informed and don't be afraid to examine your own beliefs: Most of us are products of a society that holds to rigid gender roles, and we have been influenced by our cultural background. We're taught what is feminine and masculine, female and male, and we expect that these bipolar categories do not change. Recognize your level of comfort with different types of gender expression and how this can affect your interactions with youth. Don't be afraid to ask questions.
• Seek to fully understand gender identity: Each person's gender identity is natural to that person. Gender identity and sexual orientation are a part of each of us and often develop uniquely. Across human experience, gender identity may be experienced as a continuum. That is, some people do not experience gender solely as female or male. It is important for youth-serving professionals to educate themselves on gender identity, sexual identity, adolescent development, and sexual and social stereotypes. Moreover, sexuality and gender expression are only two of the aspects integral to a whole person. It is important to maintain a balanced perspective in addressing the multifaceted issues of youth's development.
• Respect confidentiality: When a young person shares personal information about gender identity, you have achieved the trust of that youth. A breach of this confidence can have dire consequences for the young person. If it truly becomes necessary to share the information, first get the young person's permission.
• Know when and where to seek help: Be aware of appropriate referral agencies for crisis intervention, mental and physical health services, emergency assistance, etc. Transgender youth are often subject to abuse, homelessness, suicide, harassment, and physical violence. Be aware of your personal and organizational limits and accept that your organization may not always be the best one to assist a young person.
• Provide training for staff, board, volunteers, and youth: Up-to-date training is necessary to help staff develop sensitivity and skills to interact with youth and to prevent anyone from being derogatory to transgender people. Be sure to provide transgender youth with information that can help ensure their physical safety.
• Protect from harassment: Immediately protect transgender youth from harassment in any form, whether perpetrated by other youth, staff, or others. Make it clear that harassing and/or abusive behavior toward anyone will not be tolerated.

 

West Bengal Transgender Development Board

West Bengal government Wednesday announced the constitution of Transgender Development Board for the over 30,000 plus-strong community in the state. "The Cabinet has passed a very important decision and this reflects the soft nature and the concern of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee," state Women and Child Welfare Minister Sashi Panja said announcing the constitution of the board. "Quite often we have seen that they (transgenders) have been deprived of education, employment opportunities, begging on the streets and going through gross neglect," she said as follows:

 

"To attend to their problems, we have constituted a board. This will be the first board in the country which is formed for development and not welfare, which are formed for charity," Panja said. The board would be headed by a chairperson appointed by the state cabinet and have 12 members and representatives from various transgender communities, she said. "We will hand them out I-cards, look after their health and education and ensure overall development which is their right", Panja said, adding, it would help in having a proper census of the community. "But we believe there will be much more (transgenders)," she said. Only Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra have transgender development bodies but those are meant for welfare and not development, she added.

 

Tamil Nadu Transgender Welfare Board

Enumeration is one of the first activities conducted by the TGWB in 2008 and partly in 2009. With inputs from the community representatives, an action plan was devised on how best to know the number of aravanis in Tamil Nadu, and to capture socio-demographic and other relevant information to help planning evidence-informed welfare schemes. Enumeration form was prepared with inputs from the community representatives, pilot-tested and fine-tuned. To ensure successful enumeration, information about the enumeration was provided through various channels that include advertisements in the Tamil newspapers, radio, and TG-specific gatherings (such as Koovagam festival), and messages through posters, community leaders, and staff of agencies working with transgender people.

 

Tamil Nadu has 32 districts. TGWB community representatives helped in identifying two TG community people for each district who served as field staff for enumeration. There was a centralised training for all the field staff on how to enumerate and fill the enumeration form. Enumerators engaged in outreach, data collection and submitted the filled-in form to TGWB. After the survey, community enumerators informed TG people through written communication or by word-of mouth about the screening process required to provide them an identity card (See diagram 3). In each district, a district level screening committee was constituted by TGWB. In general, the committee was under the Chairmanship of District Collector and members included Deputy Director of Medical and Rural Health Services, District Social Welfare Officer, a clinical psychologist, a psychiatrist, and a transgender community representative.

 

The function of the committee was to screen the self-identified transgender persons and certify them as aravani. The committee assessed psychological (Transgenderism) status and emasculation status (that is, whether or not the person has undergone emasculation or sex change operation). In particular, role of the community representative was to assess whether the person belongs to the transgender community (irrespective of self-identify of the person).

 

The committee acknowledged the diversities within the transgender community in relation to attire and sex change operation, and agreed that persons who belong to one of the following categories can be considered as 'aravani' for programmatic purposes. - Persons who have undergone emasculation, live in full-time woman attire, and who may or may not be living with their biological family members - Persons who have not undergone emasculation (yet), live in full-time woman attire, and who may or may not live with their biological family members - Persons who are affiliated with the Aravani's Jamath system, who may or may not have undergone emasculation, live in part-time woman attire or even full-time male attire, and who may or may not be living with their biological family members For persons who are certified as aravani by the screening committee, the TGWB issued ID card within a reasonable time period.

 

By the case study was not intended to be an evaluation of the Tamil Nadu Transgender Welfare Board. However, the following recommendations are based on the available evidence gathered during this instrumental case study. Strengthen the governance of TGWB by expanding the official membership and ensuring regional representation of elected non-official members (TG representatives) currently; the board has both official and non-official members. The official membership can be expanded to include representatives from other relevant government bodies such as Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society and Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board. 

 

As the non-official members (TG representatives) are elected, there is a need for regional representation in the election process and mechanisms need to be devised for the same.  To benefit from the experience and expertise of other people who are working on the issues of transgender people, TGWB can establish an advisory committee that include but not limited to media representatives, writers, social activists, and medical experts. Strengthen the management capacity of TGWB by having dedicated staff to oversee implementation and liaise with government officials and civil society representatives As the work burden of TGWB is increasing, there is a need for a secretariat for the TGWB, and it can be managed by adequate number of staff members who focus primarily or exclusively on the TGWB tasks.

 

These dedicated staff will then carry out the administrative and managerial tasks, coordinate with other government department and bodies, and liaise with the transgender communities. Thus, having dedicated staff will greatly increase the efficiency and effectiveness of TGWB. Develop a consensus on who can be the beneficiaries of the schemes of TGWB  Currently, there is lack of consensus on who are aravanis and thus who should be issued TGWB  identity card (this is in spite of lack of any mention of the term aravani in the card). A consensus definition of aravanis (or who should be given TGWB identity card) need to be developed to ensure that all needy aravanis are supported through the various schemes of TGWB. 

 

Also, a consensus decision needs to be made on the inclusion of other sexual minorities such as female-to-male transgender people, and feminine kothi-identified persons (irrespective of whether are not they are currently in the jamath system of aravanis) who are from poor socioeconomic background and engage in sex work. Take steps to ensure that the identity card issued by TGWB can be used a valid, government authenticated document for identity and address proof Currently, the identity card issued by TGWB primarily serves as an authentication of the aravani identity of the card holder and thus determine eligibility of the card holder for accessing schemes of TGWB or the state government.

 

As often the TG people do not have any other government-issued card that can serve as an authentic identity/address proof, the identity card issued by TGWB should be recognized as a valid government-authorised card that can be used as a proof of identity and address. If so, then the TGWB identity card can be used to open bank accounts, passport application, etc. – without any problems faced by the card holders. Consider additional ways of raising finances for the TGWB activities

 

Conclusion

Currently, a particular amount is allocated for TGWB activities under the Department of Social Welfare. It is possible that different government departments can also allocate certain amount of funds from their budgets to co-finance certain schemes for TG people. 

 

The state government shall also consider allocating separate funds for TGWB and submit this request to the state planning commission so that funds can be budgeted in the next five year plan.  As TGWB is now a registered body under the Tamil Nadu Societies registration act, it is suggested that adequate corpus fund be allocated to ensure effective cash-flow. Strengthen the TG community involvement in planning, implementation and evaluation 

 

Planning: TGWB needs to periodically conduct needs assessment regionally by involving CBOs and NGOs working with TG people to understand the needs, issues, concerns, and local context of TG communities. Based on findings, needs-based schemes can be formulated. 

 

Implementation: The capacity of the TG CBOs needs to be built so that they can implement some of the schemes funded by TGWB. 

Evaluation: TGWB activities need to be evaluated periodically with involvement of TG communities at the grassroots' level to ensure that the activities are needs-based, needy TG people are benefited, and implementation of schemes is timely.

 

Reference

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